Witi Ihimaera - Uncle's Story

You know what it’s like in nightmares. It’s dark and you’re always alone. It’s like those horror movies where the actor is in a perilous position and there’s never anybody around.

And so, once again, I began to run. I could only move in slow motion. I could hear myself grinding my teeth. I heard myself moaning, willing myself to run faster, get out of there, escape from the blackness. I felt my pores pop with explosions of fear, and I was drenched with sweat.

I looked back again. I could see the stallion. Its eyes were on fire. Its hooves struck sparks like flints, taunted me, circling me in the blackness, choosing its moment. The thrum, thrum thrum was all around me and then —

There it was. Coming towards me. There was nothing I could do.

I cried out to myself, Wake up, wake up .

But the stallion was rearing up on its hind legs. It was screaming its rage and slashing out its hooves like steel blades. It shredded the blackness with arcs of fire. Its eyes were bulging. The veins on its neck were like ropes.

The hooves descending. Slashing.

Then I heard myself saying in my dream, ‘ No. ’

The stallion was standing on its hind legs. For a moment it was motionless, looking down at me. Its eyes were wild, unwavering. It whinnied again, surrounding me with its rage and fetid breath.

‘No,’ I said again.

All of a sudden, I saw that there was a bullwhip in my hands. The whip was covered in blood. And all the fury, sadness and anger of the world rushed into the whip as I raised it and began to crack it at the stallion.

‘Get back. Get back.’

The whip arced through the air. At each snap it showered sparks through the dream. The sparks fell upon the stallion, making it cry with pain. Then the whip began to sing. Its song was one of strength and power. It said, ‘I will take this no longer, I will no longer let you have power over me. From this day I will fight back and I will win.’

I brought all my rage to the bullwhip.

‘Oh, you bastard world!’ I called.

My eyes were on fire. My feet struck sparks like flints. At each crack of the lash the stallion began to diminish, to squeal with confusion and pain. It began to retreat. Slowly. Giving ground.

In the dream I heard the whip singing. I saw the stallion retreating. The arc of the whip shredded that dream until it no longer existed. Then I woke up. How Carlos had slept through my tossing and turning was beyond me.

I got out of bed, went to the bathroom and had a long hot shower. After a while an extraordinary sense of release and calm came over me. I went out into the kitchen, made myself a cup of coffee and took it out onto the balcony.

‘What’s up?’ Carlos asked, yawning and scratching his armpits.

‘I couldn’t sleep.’

He put his arms around me. ‘Well, seeing that we’re both wide awake —’

We had a race back to bed. He won.

There was still one thing left to do to complete my uncle’s story.

But first there were more immediate matters to take care of. One of them was to formally end my relationship with Jason.

‘I’ll see you in court,’ he had said. He wanted his day there — but I instructed my lawyer to give him the property or money he wanted. Half of everything, all of everything, it didn’t matter any longer. His lawyer persuaded Jason to settle out of court, and we met for the last time in his lawyer’s office.

‘Do you want me to come with you?’ Carlos asked.

‘No,’ I answered.

It was better for me to face Jason alone. But I hadn’t expected him to bring along his cheerleaders, Graham and Margo.

I can’t begin to tell you how difficult the meeting was. On my part, I was sad that our goodbyes had to take place within a legal framework. Jason was ballistic, out of control, wanting his pound of flesh.

‘You owe me more than half of everything we had together,’ he said. ‘You owe me my life back. All those wasted years with you —’

He was still spiralling, on a descent to confront whatever demons Margo had found lurking in the shadows of his life. Angry, I turned to her and Graham.

‘You are responsible for Jason now. And you both better look after him.’

I had brought roses to give Jason. He laughed with incredulity and threw them at me.

‘Keep your roses.’

The petals scattered in the air like blood.

Another matter involved Carlos. Whatever was going to happen to Roimata and me, marriage, children, would be in the future. And it would have to take into consideration the fact that I had decided to let Carlos into my life.

‘How about going to the next level?’ he asked.

I think he was surprised at my answer.

‘You give me Mayfair, Piccadilly, $5000 cash, a Chance card and a card to get me out of jail — and I’ll think about it.’

His eyes brightened.

‘Can we be a bit more specific? Is that a yes?’

‘Well, okay,’ I said, ‘but I’ll have a crayfish with that.’

Then Tane Mahuta rang me and gave me the opportunity to go to Gisborne and to settle the matter.

‘A young gay boy has died of Aids,’ Tane said. ‘His name was Waka. He comes from the Gisborne area and somebody needs to lead an ope to take his body back to his marae. Will you and Roimata do it?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It’s time, and I will be proud to lead the group.’

Tane conveniently forgot to tell me that Waka had been a rent boy on Vivian Street and that the ope, in consequence, wasn’t going to be conventional. Quite the opposite — and when I called all his friends together to discuss the travel arrangements, I gulped at the enormity of the task. Talk about a dog’s breakfast. There were about thirty who wanted to accompany Waka’s body to his marae — an assortment of other boys who were on the game, two trannies, some street kids and other teenagers with green hair, pierced noses and chains hanging from their belts.

I called Auntie Pat.

‘I need your help, Auntie Pat! Can I count on you to be at Poho o Rawiri to do the karanga when we go on?’

As for Roimata, she tried to back out. ‘Oh, no you don’t,’ I said.

Carlos promised to join us in Gisborne after attending a fisheries hui in Christchurch.

The ope started out from Wellington during the weekend. Waka was accompanied in the hearse by his boyfriend, Jewel, and a cousin, Tim. The rest of us were in cars of all descriptions, and one of them, a flash Jaguar, had been stolen — though I didn’t know it at the time. When we arrived in Gisborne, Auntie Pat said it looked like a circus had come to town. She was waiting for us at the gate to Poho o Rawiri.

‘Boy, oh boy,’ she warned. ‘There’s a big row taking place in there and you started it. Some of the dead boy’s family don’t want him back here. They may not welcome you onto the marae.’

‘We’ll wait all day and all night if we have to,’ I said. ‘It is Waka’s right to be buried in the place where he was born. He is Maori as well as gay. We’re here to make sure his right is honoured.’

Oh, I felt so proud of our ope. I didn’t care that we looked a rather odd tribe. It took courage to front up to a culture as forbidding as ours. The meeting house with its warrior carvings. The welcome ceremonies with all their strict protocol. In the old days, one false move and you could die. And the local people didn’t even want us there.

Roimata took charge of the young girls, explaining the rituals of the tangihanga and what was required of them. When Carlos arrived he gave the boys, including Jewel, a five-minute lesson on haka. None of them had been on a marae before. The bravado in Wellington had evaporated into absolute terror.